Black smoke fills the area after a fire broke out at the POSCO Pohang Steel in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province, Saturday. (Yonhap)
A fire broke out at Posco's Pohang Steelworks on Saturday, partially suspending facilities before the blaze was put out, officials said.
The fire started around 7 a.m. near a blast furnace at the steelworks in Pohang, 262 kilometers southeast of Seoul, according to South Korea's top steelmaker and local firefighting authorities. No casualties were reported.
The police initially said the fire appeared to have started from a spark caused by a gas leakage from a damaged pipe inside one of the facilities. But following a preliminary investigation, they said it started from a damaged oxygen pipe valve.
The fire triggered a blackout that led to the temporary suspension of several mills. The company said it resumed power generation after firefighters put out the blaze after 2 hours and 10 minutes.
"We don't anticipate any major impact on our overall operations," a Posco official said.
The blackout also triggered the automatic diffusion of by-product gases to prevent a buildup of gas from causing an explosion.
The process released black smoke through chimneys, which some nearby residents mistook for the fire.
"If we don't do diffusion work, it could create a dangerous situation inside the plant, such as an explosion," a company official said. "From the outside, it looks like flames and smoke, which could be perceived as a large fire, but it wasn't such a large fire."(Yonhap)
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